Ok So I am more than a little dissapointed here with imovie for the ipad. I have used imovie on the mac for a while and though I did not expect a lot of advanced editing capabilities I would have at least expected it to handle my previously shot video. I have tried all the methods listed here I have seen thus far and nothing works. I have tried several different camera's all video shot in 720p which are .mov. I can upload the files to the ipad just fine. I can even play all the files on the ipad just fine. imovie will not let me use them period. In camera roll it shows last import but its all blank. Nothing to select. Last try was with SD card. The video showed up on the device but imovie just does not see it at all. I tried converting the files various ways and nothing seems to work. I tried playing with location services and that did not make any difference either. It almost appears as if this functionality is simply blocked. You will use ONLY the camera supplied with your device, kind of thing. So My question is if I am able to play the video on the ipad, if I can see it in camera roll outside of imovie why the **** won't imovie let me see it or use it?

Hee you guys out there, I haven't bought iMovie yet, but I found this program which say that it can convert files so that you can use them on your iPad in iMovie, could someone try it out? Please; http://handbrake.fr/

Finally figured out a way to get iMovie to see my .AVI video clips taken on my Canon digi cam. This is based on using the iPad2 and a PC running Windows 7.

The iPad2 is my first Apple product and I have no idea why Apple makes it so difficult for their users to do simple tasks.

1. Download a video converter program that will convert your video to .MOV files. (I use the free Sothink Video Converter which is awesome)

2. Create a destination folder that the converter will send the converted .MOV video in "MY PICTURES" (or wherever you sync the photos from your computer to iPad from.) ** IMPORTANT** YOU MUST CREATE A SEPARATE FOLDER IN “MY PICTURES” CONTAINING THE .MOV FILES ONLY. I have found that when you mix video and photos together in one folder, iTunes will crash during the sync. (For a recent vacation, I had to make a separate folders, one containing photos and one for video from the same trip to get them on the camera roll)

3) Select the movies you want to convert in the converter program, and set the target or output folder to the new video file you just created so the program sends the converted video to that new folder. Once the program finishes converting, it will send the videos converted to .MOV files to that folder.

4) Open iTunes and connect your iPad.

5) I use selective synching for my photos, so I open the photos folder on the iPad from iTunes and put a check mark in the new .MOV video folder you just added so it will sync the videos you just converted. Click sync.

6) Once your .MOV "Photo" folder syncs with you iPad, you should be able to see the folder with the videos in your Camera Roll. Once the video's are in the camera roll, iMovie should see them.

if i take a movie recorded on ipad (one that i can see in imovie) transfer it to my pc using a photo transfer app and then put it in my photo sync folder. delete the version on my ipad and then sync the photo back....i can see it in camera roll...but it doesn't show up in imovie. to me this says that the format of the movie is not the issue... i've seen postings from march showing various options that work...but not much since then nothing...i suspect an older version of imovie might have worked but that was probably changed since then.... if anyone can advise how to get this working that would be great. thanks.

Honestly I don't think any of the work arounds work anymore. After months of tinkering and frustration I have decided that this is by design. Apple only wants people using Imovie on the Ipad to work with video shot with the Ipad. So far from what I can see Apple has been totally silent on this subject. The product is misleading in that nowhere did I see this limitation mentioned. If it was I will shut up about it. No I did not expect the same version of Imovie that I have on my Macbook Pro, for 5 bucks, but I did expect to be able to import videos in at least the same format. The fact that it does not work is no where near as frustrating as the fact that nobody from Apple has said anything about it that i can see. Apple is great at marketing and selling products however the listen to what they want to listen to and who they want to listen to. The ratings for Imovie alone should tell them something. There is a lot of dissapointment out there that needs to be addressed one way or another. Either

A) its not supported at this time

B) There are plans to add this functionality in the future , its under review

I guess I will chime in since I have been using iMovie on the iPad for doing all sorts of stuff. Here is everything I have tried with getting video on the iPad to work with iMovie

It is all about the camera connection kit - if you don't have this, you are outta luck and probably wasting a lot of time.

I messed around a lot with converting video to the proper format on my pc, but it almost always failed to work (I tried various convertors but to no avail).

Video synched using folders DOES NOT WORK.

It seems the iPad was designed to only accept video taken by iPads, iPods, or iPhones, but there are some others that work.

I personally have had success with HD video taken with my Canon SX20is in 720p. All I have to do is pop in the sd card, import the videos and they show right up in iMovie (I believe this has to do with format H.264 .mov). Since the SX20is is no longer the current model, it is hard to get your hands on them, but I believe (but have not tried this myself) that the SX130is uses the same chip that the SX20is did and records in the same format.

YouTube and KeepVid are your friends. When all else fails, upload a video to youtube, let them convert it. Then use KeepVid to download the mp4 720p version of the file. Rename the file to ABCD0001.mp4 and place it in a DCIM/100ABCDE/ folder on an SD card. Place the SD card into the camera connection kit, import it, and it will show up in iMovie. This can also work for taking any video from Youtube. I have used this a lot. I usually use the 480p version of the file though since there seems to be a problem that occasionally crops up with HD video exporting back to the Camera Roll and I have to use my iPod touch to render the video (which is ridiculously backward) see https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3160257?start=0&tstart=0

I just tried ReelDirector with much success. What I originally wanted to do was add in a recorded talking Tom video into my movie and this worked nicely. ReelDirector is not quite as friendly as iMovie but it worked like a charm.

I'm not sure why other people have problems, but I can import videos taken on my iPhone 3GS and my iPad 2 using the "Photos (including videos)" option on the Photos tab in iTunes 10.5 for Windows. Any video that's in a photo album can be imported into iMovie on my iPad 2. It's always worked that way for me ever since I got iMovie on my iPad 2.

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